


won't take the easy road

by leonshardt



Category: Borderlands, Tales from the Borderlands - Fandom
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-29
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-04 01:35:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5315276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leonshardt/pseuds/leonshardt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Try being domestic after saving the world (again).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Rhys

**Author's Note:**

> i wish there was more ot3 work in the fandom :(

Rhys groans awake right as the sun starts to peak through the Purple Skag’s front shutters. Funny thing about Helios is there’s no sunrises to smack you in the face after a particularly bad night. Rhys blinks away the stars, tries to push himself upright. The barstool wobbles beneath him. He fell asleep at the goddamn bar on August’s watch. The jerk better have some answers.

His head hurts. His hand hurts too—upon closer inspection, his first two knuckles are raw and bruised purple. Did he punch someone? He tries to remember. Can't. Pulse is throbbing in his head like bullymong trying to punch its way out of his skull.

“Oh, hey.” August comes around the corner, kicking a broom and dustbin behind the bar. He looks far better than Rhys feels, and it’s kind of pissing him off. “You’re finally awake.”

Rhys presses the heels of him palms against his eyes. Take several deep breaths and then scrunches up his face at the stale taste in his mouth. “What happened?” he says.

August doesn’t even look up. “You got drunk. Tried to punch a guy after he grabbed Sasha’s ass. Don’t get me wrong, it was a very noble gesture and all but Hyperion really needs to teach their employees how _not_ to get their asses kicked in a bar fight.”

Rhys grimaces. Yeah, that kind of makes sense from what little he can remember of last night. That’s just like August to end his fights for him and then leave him passed out at the bar. Suddenly Rhys really wishes he wasn’t the only one left hungover in the morning.

If Rhys hadn’t seen irrefutable proof that August could even get drunk, he’d swear that the guy had booze pumping through his veins instead of blood. He says he doesn’t drink on the job, but pretty much anything passably drinkable on Pandora had a fifty-fifty chance of making you sicker than a dog anyway. Bastard must have built up an immunity from living in this craphole of a planet for so long. With any luck he’ll never find out what August puts in those cocktails. The knowledge itself might be enough to make him puke. Shit tastes like diesel and bandit piss. Not that he’d ever say that to August’s face—he’s got enough prosthetics already, thank you very much.

“Where’s Sasha?” he mumbles.

“Out.”

Fine with him. She’d probably just make fun of him anyway. Rhys staggers over to the ratty couch in the corner and collapses into it, wincing when his back twinges like creaky springs. He’s gotta stop staying over at the Purple Skag. It may be better than the other bars in town, but it’s not exactly _good._ Sasha likes to joke that their collective life expectancy goes down a few notches every time August conducts his “business” in here. Not that August doesn’t know what he’s doing—he’s got a few guns concealed under the bar, including a Tediore shotgun that tends to shut people up once he’s got the business end pointed in people’s faces—but after everything Rhys has been through, a little peace and quiet goes a long way.

August saunters over and offers him a glass of water, which Rhys gratefully gulps down. The seat cushions dip as August settles in beside him, arms crossed. He speaks without looking Rhys in the face. “Didn’t think you were the type to start fights over petty shit. You just decked the guy like you were crazy or something.”

Rhys sighs. Bits and pieces of last night are coming back to him, and it’s really not as impressive as he would have hoped. He’s been jittery ever since Helios crashed, flinching at every flash of blue out of the corner of his eye, every jump of static from his new cybernetics. The feeling that he’s being watched lingers in the back of his brain like a bad habit. You don’t just rip out Handsome Jack from your brain and then expect everything to go back to normal after that. And the asshole from last night must’ve set something off in him. Something more than just grabbing his girlfriend’s ass, anyway. A smirk. A blue jacket. Fucking _pet names._

Rhys grunts and gives a noncommittal shrug. In any case it’s way too early to be talking about his _feelings_. It’s bad enough that he screams in his sleep, loud enough to wake up Sasha and August in the middle of the night. Sasha doesn’t pry, just shushes him and brushes his sweaty hair away from his forehead while August wraps his arms around his waist, both of them holding him securely until he falls back asleep. It’s really not something he wants to bring up in the morning, but luckily his two bedfellows aren’t the nosy type. Usually.

August just rolls his eyes. “Yeah, whatever. You still owe me a blowjob, though.” Rhys chokes a little at that and August says, “Yeah, well, I’m not in the business of saving your ass for free, dumbass.”

“Well if recall correctly, you seemed to like my ass perfectly fine earlier this week—“

August jabs him in the stomach. It’s obvious he’s pulling his punches, because a full-force blow to the gut from August would leave him pissing blood for a week; that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt like a motherfucker, though.

“ _Ow_ , you bastard!” Rhys may still be hungover and remarkably uncoordinated, but he still manages to tackle August off the couch and onto the floor. They wrestle until Rhys falls asleep on top of August and they stay like that until Sasha comes back.


	2. August

He’d say he was alone now, but that wouldn’t be entirely true. He lost one family and gained another, and he’s not about to call the net losses just yet. The fact is, a part of him was lost when his ma died. He doesn’t want Vaughn’s awkward pity or Rhys’s sad looks. What the guys from Hyperion don’t know is that Pandora is a planet of orphans. Always has been. August’s just been lucky enough to have known his parents at all.

He tells himself this the day after she dies. Repeats it to himself as he gets dressed, and again at her funeral, a small affair at the edge of Hollowpoint’s grimy sprawl. Graveyards are mostly just a formality down here; a lot of bodies never make it into coffins, let alone graves. But August wants something to remember his Ma by. The only picture he has of her is several years old; she is smiling and has less grey in her hair. Back then he wasn’t yet busting heads for cash. It was a long time ago.

When he gets back to the Purple Skag, Rhys and Sasha are having loud sex on the couch. Maybe the bed was too far away for their purposes. Maybe they just didn’t care. Can’t blame them. Neither seem to notice August as he makes his way upstairs.

Rhys is stark naked and Sasha is on his lap, hair wild and loose. She’s panting into his neck as she grinds down onto Rhys. August tries not to look.

He fails and looks.

He goes to the bedroom, stuffs his head under a pillow, and tries to drown out the sounds. He’s not sure if this is a net loss or a fucked up gain.

An hour later, Sasha crawls into bed with him. August lets out a grunt of displeasure when her cold toes touch his. “Hey,” Sasha whispers, scooting flush up against his back. August is torn between moving away and leaning closer into her touch.

“Wrong bed,” he grunts. “Rhys is on the couch outside.”

Sasha pauses, her fingers trailing up under his shirt. “I know. I saw you looking. Do you want me to call him in here?”

August hates the way his dick twitches at the way she says it. He wants to take off his nice clothes from the funeral. Maybe burn them in the back alley for the heck of it, or just so he won’t ever feel what it’s like to be in mourning again. What else does he have to lose?

Rhys comes to bed with them and it’s much warmer with three. He keeps his eyes open as he kisses him.

So maybe he’s not ready to count his losses. But if anything, he’s willing to put this down as a gain.


End file.
